-I would always compare the final mix of my songs to a song that is mixed in great quality and has the same kind of vibe, to see what makes it sound different. Most professionally mixed songs just have a certain warmth that seems impossible for us to get to when we aren't using the same equipment, but sometimes, you may compare and just realize small things that stick out. Most of Dre's "2001" era beats were mixed great, as well as DJ Quik's Rhythmalism...and since my style was usually West Coast, it was good to compare those.

-If you are aiming to make a club track, play it right between some major club hits and see if it still has that same energy and vibe. If it is truly strong enough, you'll be able to tell...but if not, you'll realize that damn, it just doesn't have that power to it.

-I would always compare the final mix of my songs to a song that is mixed in great quality and has the same kind of vibe, to see what makes it sound different. Most professionally mixed songs just have a certain warmth that seems impossible for us to get to when we aren't using the same equipment, but sometimes, you may compare and just realize small things that stick out. Most of Dre's "2001" era beats were mixed great, as well as DJ Quik's Rhythmalism...and since my style was usually West Coast, it was good to compare those.

-If you are aiming to make a club track, play it right between some major club hits and see if it still has that same energy and vibe. If it is truly strong enough, you'll be able to tell...but if not, you'll realize that damn, it just doesn't have that power to it.

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i think cross refferencing is the best way to achieve the sound you are looking for...in most cases, there's a song that has been made already that you can get an idea of how the energy comes out...its almost a guide so to speak...i use a cross refference everytime im mixing...to help guide me, especially with Vocal levels...eq's...plus it helps with opening the beat up on the eq's so the vocals fit with in the song instead of ontop.

-If you are aiming to make a club track, play it right between some major club hits and see if it still has that same energy and vibe. If it is truly strong enough, you'll be able to tell...but if not, you'll realize that damn, it just doesn't have that power to it.

^^I think one thing rookies do is try to fill up an empty beat with different instruments that don't really blend...versus using these instruments to help the song itself out. They'll have sounds that may even clash with each other, or that may sound good individually with no music...but it won't really fit in the song itself. Even some commercial songs will show examples of this...just because a sound is on key doesn't mean it is helpin the beat out.

A lot of Dre's songs and Quincy Jones MJ era songs show great examples of how other instruments help the song out, and create the overall melody...take Rock with you, where different instruments all play different keys, but they all blend perfect...and the instruments behind that melody support it.

A simple little trick I use to find samples is use itunes/amazon and other sites like that to browse similar artists and even listen to snippets of the songs... then from there DL the artists I choose from torrents... get discography's at a time that way... pretty simple but might be a tip to some!

this guy mixed one of my songs with bone crusher and Bun B when bone was signed to Jive records. I flew down to miami to circle house to sit in on the mix. he did not do a great job, but when john frye mixed the same song, he killed it. the dude started with the kick drum, and built everything around that. the problem was, the type of instruments I used, were not typical southern/808 type of sounds. and so he mixed it expecting there to be really bright and high energy sounds, when most of the sounds were laid back, west coast-sounding instruments. that was the first error. the second error was when we were mixing a vocal bone crusher had recorded over one of the instruments I had produced. he had layered what was the bass melody with his own voice. but as we all know, the voice trembles naturally, which will be specially noticable at low frequencies, which is where he was signing. the result is a rumble. well, fabian ran a filter that brought out all of the lows on the signing. on the yamaha ns-10s, and even on the big boys, tthe mix sounded cool. when it came on in the club, it just sounded like a loud ass distorted rumble. some people really liked it,others thought it sounded crazy as hell. a lot of the instruments kind of got drowned out, but he definitely had the snare and the kick out front of the mix. i was actually experiecning a bit of self-doubt after he mixed it, because the levels of the song came out so strange. i figured it was a flaw in my production. then a diff guy mixed the record, and it came out 100% different... clean... loud.,.. he filted out bone's low vocals and let the bass be clean... those are a few tips i observed while in the lab

this guy mixed one of my songs with bone crusher and Bun B when bone was signed to Jive records. I flew down to miami to circle house to sit in on the mix. he did not do a great job, but when john frye mixed the same song, he killed it. the dude started with the kick drum, and built everything around that. the problem was, the type of instruments I used, were not typical southern/808 type of sounds. and so he mixed it expecting there to be really bright and high energy sounds, when most of the sounds were laid back, west coast-sounding instruments. that was the first error. the second error was when we were mixing a vocal bone crusher had recorded over one of the instruments I had produced. he had layered what was the bass melody with his own voice. but as we all know, the voice trembles naturally, which will be specially noticable at low frequencies, which is where he was signing. the result is a rumble. well, fabian ran a filter that brought out all of the lows on the signing. on the yamaha ns-10s, and even on the big boys, tthe mix sounded cool. when it came on in the club, it just sounded like a loud ass distorted rumble. some people really liked it,others thought it sounded crazy as hell. a lot of the instruments kind of got drowned out, but he definitely had the snare and the kick out front of the mix. i was actually experiecning a bit of self-doubt after he mixed it, because the levels of the song came out so strange. i figured it was a flaw in my production. then a diff guy mixed the record, and it came out 100% different... clean... loud.,.. he filted out bone's low vocals and let the bass be clean... those are a few tips i observed while in the lab

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Damn...that is crazy as hell to me.

I DEFINITELY know what you are saying...on the first album I produced for this local group back in 2002, the dude mixing was good at mixing R&B, but not for rap...and it was evident when listening to the final mix. I was new to mixing, and didn't understand why he would want me to put every single instrument and drum separate for him to mix....but when I heard what he did with each one, it really killed the overall sound of many songs. The drums ended up being WAAAAAAY too low....just opening up the wave files of the original mixes I did and comparing them to his mixes showed a MAJOR difference, and anyone who can read waves would realize how soft the drums were...they weren't CLOSE to hitting the max non-distorted level.

I feel that producers should pay attention to who mixes their songs, because the same exact beat can sound COMPLETELY different if it goes to two different people. It's evident when you may hear stories of lesser/unknown producers and how they blame other producers for "stealing" their beats, or even when these unknown producers will ghost produce for major producers...but when you hear the rest of their beats, they don't sound nearly as good as the one that the established dude mixed.

Try and make the(primary) melody come back to the first note. LOL [teet] I know it's basic shit.

But when I'm making a melody, the ones I like the best are the ones where I'm looking for that last note and it happens to be the first note. Obviously that won't work for descending or ascending melodies, but if it has a curve, generally the ones that come full circle will sound the best.